Nominations for RDI and Honorary RDI in 2014 Fernando Gutiérrez

Nominations for RDI and Honorary RDI in 2014 Fernando Gutiérrez RDI for raising awareness of challenging social and political issues through design, and for promoting the visual arts in the international cultural sector “I am delighted and very honoured to be appointed a Royal Designer for Industry. Through graphic design I strive to produce work that improves people's lives and gives meaning. This award gives me the strength and confidence to continue into an ever changing world, where good design has a fundamental role. I look forward to participating with the RSA and other RDIs in helping to inspire others.” Over the past two decades, Fernando Gutiérrez has developed into a highly individual and distinctive graphic designer, and of the most talented in the UK. Through his many books, catalogues, magazines, exhibitions and posters, he has raised public awareness of challenging social issues, made museum and gallery collections more accessible, and reignited public interest in classic literature. Gutiérrez has worked across Europe, in Argentina, Vietnam and Australia, stimulating audiences to discover more about the arts through his work with many artists, photographers, museums, galleries, and arts organisations, including the Prado Museum in Madrid, the Design Museum, Tate, V&A, and The Museum of London. Over 80 per cent of Gutiérrez’s work is in the cultural sector, and although not always the most lucrative path, it is one that he has always been passionate about. He believes art is particularly important for society; seeing ourselves reflected in the visual arts gives us a greater understanding of ourselves and therefore should be cherished and supported. Gutiérrez’s natural flair as an editorial designer is evident in the diverse range of publications he has worked on. His passion for story-telling photography was instrumental in his appointment as the Creative Director of Colors magazine by the renowned designer and co- founder, Tibor Kalman. Published by Fabrica, the leading communications research centre in Treviso, Colors has faithfully documented a changing world by highlighting the lives of the people who live in it, promoting the importance of cultural diversity in an increasingly homogenised planet. Through his creative direction of Colors Gutiérrez presented important global issues in innovative and persuasive ways through his thoughtful design work and his commissioning of world-class reportage photographers. He radically transformed its presentation to allow the photography, illustrations and copywriting to shine. Gutiérrez collaborated closely with the editorial team in Italy and was able to present in-depth stories in an arresting and unflinching manner on challenging political and social issues often overlooked or shunned by other magazines, such as madness, slavery, ageing, HIV, prostitution, genocide, and violence, to name just a few. The unexpected, clean, simple approach had a considerable impact on the editorial design scene with many magazines following a similar path. At present Colors is available in 5 bilingual editions: English/Italian, English/French, English/Spanish, English/Chinese and English/Korean. Gutiérrez has been involved in designing many exhibitions (including the recent V&A The Glamour of Italian Fashion 1945 – 2014), both in the UK and in Europe, creating a valuable, engaging and educational experience for the visiting public. His design strategies for the Prado Museum in Madrid have seen visitor numbers double from 1.2 million in 2002 to 2.3 million in 2013, and has enabled Buenos Aires based publisher Losada to revive 2000 titles of Hispanic literature that were previously out of print. A keen supporter of design education, Gutiérrez regularly give talks around the world and has been a visiting lecturer at the Eina School of Design and Art in Barcelona since 1994, and has run a Summer School workshop on art direction and collaboration for the Masters course in Typography since 2007. He is an external examiner on the BA Graphics course at Manchester School of Art and London College of Communication. http://www.fernandogutierrez.co.uk/ Richard Rogers RDI for his pioneering and influential approach to urban design and improving the quality of public spaces to create thriving and resilient cities (RDI) “It is an honour to receive the Royal Designer for Industry. Design matters at every level – from a teaspoon, to a chair, to a building, to the city. As our population increases, the compact city is the only sustainable way of living; well-designed buildings and public spaces are essential to making a success of compact city living. More than that, good design at all scales enriches all our lives.” Richard Rogers first came to prominence in the late 1960s with the competition-winning scheme for the Pompidou centre in Paris, and he has been at the cutting edge of architecture and urban design for 50 years since. He has twice won the Stirling prize, first for the Madrid international airport and more recently with the Maggie’s Centre in London. Perhaps his greatest legacy though is his contribution to urbanism, through the work of the Urban Task Force and the publications resulting from it, which arguably have had more influence on the development of sustainable and liveable cities than any other design initiative in the last 30 years. Richard Rogers is best known around the world for his influential high profile design work and innovative approach to urbanism. His practice has always had a fascination with improving the design industry, for instance in the award winning Oxley Park scheme, which brought modern prefabrication techniques to a very traditional area of the construction industry. His pioneering work in low energy design gave us exemplars such as the naturally ventilated Welsh Assembly rooms and the Bordeaux law courts. His delight in structurally specific long span curvilinear structures gave us the airports at Madrid and Heathrow’s Terminal 5. Rogers’s highly successful architectural practice is also a model for an alternative enterprise. The practice set itself up with a strong and public belief in profit-sharing with employees and is in fact owned by a charity which distributes excess profits to selected good causes. For many years Richard Rogers was the chair and spokesperson for the Urban Task Force set up to raise the standard of urban design in London and the UK. Its influence was global, and the publications resulting from it remain some of the most significant guidelines for creating liveable and workable cities, which have helped improve public spaces and lead to a much greater emphasis on the quality of the public realm over the last decade. Richard Rogers had more influence through his position as adviser to the mayor of London in the Livingstone era than any other member of his profession. Rogers’s work has been celebrated in exhibitions throughout his career. Two of the most recent include the personal retrospective at the Royal Academy last year and the current RIBA/V&A exhibition at the RIBA to coincide with the TV series on “The Brits who built the Modern World”. The publications of his theoretical work include: Cities for a Small Planet (the publication of his Reith Lectures in 1997), Towards and Urban Renaissance (the final report of the UK governments Urban Task Force 1999), Cities for a Small Country (2000) Richard Rogers’s belief in the positive impact that architecture and urban design can bring to society is deep rooted and infectious. No single member of the profession more clearly exemplifies the belief that artists and designers have a duty to society to improve the Built Environment. He continues in his eightieth decade to provide an inspiration to young designers and architects. http://www.rsh-p.com 2 Helen Storey RDI for pushing the boundaries of fashion and design and making challenging scientific concepts accessible to the public. “For many years I have instinctively felt that our progress relies upon taking the right kinds of risks through purposeful collision and experimentation in between the disciplines. The aptitudes that designers need nowadays have had to change, in order for us to flourish and respond to our rapidly shifting world. My work has often been therefore, hard to categorise, my practice demands a hybrid response to what I feel the world is asking of us - so it has been an absolute joy to find that my work has been recognised by the Royal Society of Arts and all that it stands for, not just for me, but for everyone who follows their intuition, beyond trend and towards the betterment of us all.” Professor Helen Storey MBE studied fashion design and achieved critical acclaim in the industry for many years before changing the focus of her career to explore new creative challenges within the field of science. Having worked with Valentino in Rome, she returned to London and in 1986 launched her eponymous label. Her collections were noted for questioning traditional notions of glamour, she created boas made from rags and evening gowns made from plastic refuse-bags and printed with corporate logos. In 1991, Helen Storey won Most Innovative Designer of the Year for fashion and was nominated for British Designer of the Year. For over three decades Helen Storey has been producing inspirational and exciting works in the public realm, as well as in academic and corporate spheres. Drawn into the world of scientific research her first project in collaboration with her sister Dr Kate Storey, funded by the Wellcome Trust, resulted in Primitive Streak – a collection of 27 dresses that take the viewer through the first 1,000 hours of human life. Helen has created several science inspired projects since, including Wonderland (nominated for a Design Museum Design award) and Catalytic Clothing with co-collaborator Professor Tony Ryan OBE (University of Sheffield) with whom she has been working with for the past 10 years – breaking down boundaries between art, fashion and science.

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